Christendom’s Most Eligible Bachelor: Traditional Catholic Looking for Wife Blog

[JMarie]

On 12/7/2017 at 4:59 PM, Palimpsest said:

The funeral Mass went quite quickly.  The NO but apparently stick-up-the-rear priest declared that only Catholics (heavy stress) in a state of grace (more heavy stress) should come up for communion.  

I went to two Catholic funerals this week (fun week!).  They were at the same church, but different priests each time.  I know that at one funeral, the priest said something about Catholics and {possibly the line about state of grace}; I'm not sure about the other one.  For both, most of the attendees received communion.  So, either they weren't paying attention and got in line at the appropriate time, like they would for a regular Sunday service, or they're all super-duper graceful Catholics.  My money's on the former.

[adidas]

20 hours ago, smittykins said:

My cousin converted to Catholicism in the 80s, and at her wedding Mass, her parents and our grandmother, all Presbyterian, received Communion(I assumed they obtained a dispensation).  As I recall, this was just before the notice that "We welcome those not united with us to worship, but they must not receive Communion" appeared in the missalettes).

I’m not catholic but when I was a kid I went to mass a couple of times with friends. One time I went I took communion - it was normal to do that in my church so I didn’t think it was forbidden. After mass I was told I had committed a mortal sin and was going to hell. 

Same church - my cousin and her husband started the process of having their son baptised and when they went to their first meeting with the priest he declared that he could never christen ‘the bastard child’ of unmarried parents.  My cousin said he was wrong - she got married in that very church 5 years ago. His response was that he personally didn’t officiate the marriage so they weren’t truly married. So they got another priest to dunk him. 

[elliha]

1 hour ago, adidas said:

Same church - my cousin and her husband started the process of having their son baptised and when they went to their first meeting with the priest he declared that he could never christen ‘the bastard child’ of unmarried parents.  My cousin said he was wrong - she got married in that very church 5 years ago. His response was that he personally didn’t officiate the marriage so they weren’t truly married. So they got another priest to dunk him. 

That last priest must have had some issues. So pretty much the whole world is then not married properly? He must be very busy if only him marrying someone makes it valid, he wouldn't be able to find time for a Christening because there must be millions of Catholics who find it important to be married and he would be obligated to marry them to help save their souls. I must say he puts little faith in his church if not another priest can be trusted to marry someone the proper way. And he was an asshole too, that is clear.

My church isn't too bothered about where you marry but you can do a ceremony of a marriage made in another religion or at town hall to make it "Christian" if that is important to you but it is not a demand. If you are considered married by the state itself you are married in their eyes too. You can also do a blessing of a marriage that happened in our church or another church, kind of like a vow renewal but the funny thing is that the only thing you do not repeat are your vows. They are just said once, at the original ceremony as they were a promise to god and last forever. You can just have a priest say a prayer for you and you can choose to repeat the whole ceremony but the vows. If you were not married before god (as in not married in a Christian church) they can be repeated but then it is the part that involves god that is said for a first time, the promises you made to your spouse are considered to have happen from the time you had your initial marriage.

[Terrie]

So everyone was saying how his complaint that he can't get hired because of being a trad. Catholic made no sense, because they can't ask about your religion. Turns out, they don't have to. He put it in his bio on his professional page. 

Quote

As a traditional practicing Roman Catholic, Chris exclusively attends the Traditional Latin Mass acknowleding that the early buildings ever constructed were religious structures, and that they are taught in architecture and design schools over the world today. 

Irrelevant information, bad spelling, incoherent sentence. Maybe that's why he can't get hired.

[anjulibai]

My mom was a lapsed Catholic, and my dad was, at least when they married, a Presbyterian (I'm not sure what I'd call him now, but he goes to a church). Their wedding was done by with some random minister my dad found in a phone book. My mom wanted to have me baptized as both a Catholic and a Presbyterian, and raise me in both faiths, but my dad didn't want me to be exposed to Catholicism at all, so I wasn't baptized. When they divorced, it ended up being written into the divorce agreement that I not be raised in any faith. 

Both really regretted that, because I ended up an agnostic. I know my dad would rather I be Catholic than not believe, and my mom was just worried for my soul. 

Anyways, the few times we went to a Catholic church, my mom made me take communion. I'm not really sure why. I didn't realize until later I wasn't supposed to as I had never had a confession. I even had the wine once, which my mom told me I shouldn't have done because I was going to get a cold. 

I'm not really sure why she made me, but she seemed to feel it was very important I do it. The priest never said anything or asked. Then again, he was a pretty liberal priest. He did a wedding mass for my uncle's 5th marriage. 

[Hane]

There are crazy priests out there who make up their own rules. When my Baptist cousin and his Catholic fiancée visited her priest to schedule their wedding, the priest was cool with everything until my cousin mentioned his religion. The priest became livid, saying things like “There will be no music!” when the bride said she wanted my cousin’s twin sister to be their soloist. The interview concluded when my cousin told the priest, “If you didn’t have that collar on, I’d ask you out into the alley to settle things.” Ultimately, they found a priest cousin of the bride who flew into town to marry them.

[Palimpsest]

11 hours ago, JMarie said:

So, either they weren't paying attention and got in line at the appropriate time, like they would for a regular Sunday service, or they're all super-duper graceful Catholics.  My money's on the former.

 

At this particular funeral we, and perhaps the rest of the congregation, took our cues from the lapsed son and daughter of Uncle J.  When they didn't go up for communion, neither did we.  The subject came up at the lunch after the funeral.  Apparently Uncle J had arranged his funeral in advance (when he first started having dementia symptoms) but didn't specify a particular priest.  The immediate family were given to understand by the ass that ended up doing the funeral that he would pointedly and publicly refuse communion to people he knew had lapsed.

I really think it is up to the individual priest.  Most wouldn't be a stick-up-the-rear about things like that at a funeral.  Screw this particular priest.

[anjulibai]

Yeah, Catholic priests can be a mixed bag. Some are very nice and understanding, and some have sticks up their asses. 

Some friends of my husband's (who happen to be astronomers) stopped going to their parish church because the priest kept having sermons about creationism and how evolution and the Big Bang theory were false and evil. This is despite the Catholic Church position that neither is in conflict with Church teaching. Hell, the former had major contributions by Catholic priests in it's development, and the latter was actually proposed by a Catholic priest. 

[Red Hair, Black Dress]

Built in 1924, St. Mary's Catholic high school in Fredericksburg, TX has Science * Religion * Patriotism carved over the portico.  I love that science is first.

https://school.stmarysfbg.com/history

 

[Briefly]

On 12/8/2017 at 3:45 PM, hoipolloi said:

Not a Catholic and not likely to ever be one, but will admit that tears came to my eyes when I read Pope Francis' pronouncement that our pets will be in heaven with us.

IF anything were ever likely to make me think about converting, it would be the prospect of seeing my beloved dogs & cats in the afterlife.

My mother was Cherokee, we don't know how much because she chose to pretend to be Mexican American (long story and has nothing to do with faith) and it wasn't until after her death that we discovered her true heritage and as a result, ours.  But after my daughter started dating her Cherokee boyfriend, I realized that most of the traditions, beliefs and stories of my childhood were actually Cherokee.  One of the things mom taught us was that every living thing was made by the Creator and that animals had some sort of a soul force. Therefore, they would go to heaven.  It might be with us or it might be their own, but that God made them and he loved all His creatures.  It sounds quite a bit like Pope Francis' statement, in my opinion.

23 hours ago, ViolaSebastian said:

My boyfriend once had a philosophical conversation with a priest on this very topic. The priest told him that since animals were always in a state of grace, that they would go to heaven. I thought that was a lovely way of looking at it. 

I think that is beautiful, and yes - it's a perfect way of looking at it.

[PennySycamore]

I think that CS Lewis believed that our pets would go to heaven.  He just could not conceive of a loving god not allowing animals into heaven.

[mango_fandango]

I remember the idea of pets in heaven coming up in a James Herriot book when one of his clients (owner) was dying, and she was worrying because she was religious and her faith taught her that animals didn’t go to Heaven, and Herriot said that as animals are loving creatures then they would definitely go to Heaven, and that if admission there was based on being loving then more animals would end up there than humans. Which is a good way of thinking about it.

[singsingsing]

I always ended the Lord's Prayer with 'for thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory, for ever and ever, amen' because of my Anglican upbringing. I learned that many Christians leave the doxology off when I started attending a Presbyterian church in my early 20s and was extremely confused when they (in my mind) cut out the last sentence. I would still repeat it to myself in my head. Those ingrained habits die hard!

[ViolaSebastian]

1 hour ago, singsingsing said:

I always ended the Lord's Prayer with 'for thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory, for ever and ever, amen' because of my Anglican upbringing. I learned that many Christians leave the doxology off when I started attending a Presbyterian church in my early 20s and was extremely confused when they (in my mind) cut out the last sentence. I would still repeat it to myself in my head. Those ingrained habits die hard!

Whenever I hear someone say "may the force be with you," I'm always screaming in my head "AND ALSO WITH YOU!!!"

[mango_fandango]

I went to a Church of England primary school and we did a Eucharist about once a term. Even though I'm not religious I tended to take part; it wasn't a problem for my parents. Anyway, at the end we used to do the "peace be with you" thing and shake hands with those either side... except, being primary school kids (aged 4/5-11) we always turned it into "shake hands with as many people as possible" 

[PennySycamore]

@mango_fandango, I remember that story in one of the Herriot books!

[EmiGirl]

I'm Baptist and we have a shaking hands/greeting time at the beginning of our service.

 

 

ETA: was Baptist. Not going to be attending a SBC church  in my new city.

Edited December 10, 2017 by EmiGirl

[Pianokeeper]

One of my favorite bumper stickers I'd occasionally see around Atlanta simply says:

And also with y'all. 

I feel like it says so much (about the car's owners) in so few words that it's basically perfect poetry. 

[subsaharanafrica]

10 hours ago, ViolaSebastian said:

Whenever I hear someone say "may the force be with you," I'm always screaming in my head "AND ALSO WITH YOU!!!"

It’s “and with your spirit” now. Quite a few pieces of the English language mass were changed under Benedict XVI to make it more in line with what is being said in other languages. 

[zeebaneighba]

13 hours ago, ViolaSebastian said:

Whenever I hear someone say "may the force be with you," I'm always screaming in my head "AND ALSO WITH YOU!!!"

OMG, I just realized I totally do that!

Also raised Anglican, here.  The Lord's Prayer seems weirdly truncated without the last line.  I was also thrown by the use of "debts" instead of "trespasses."

[SilverBeach]

Yeah, I need that last line in the Lords Prayer so I won't stumble over myself trying to stop from saying it.

[elliha]

I have have severe allergies to anything furry so if heaven is anything like life on earth I do expect god to allow me to have a dog or two. But I do fall into the category that believes that heaven is going to be so different to life here that we cannot even imagine what it is like so I don't usually try to do so.

[Howl]

23 hours ago, Red Hair, Black Dress said:

Built in 1924, St. Mary's Catholic high school in Fredericksburg, TX has Science * Religion * Patriotism carved over the portico.  I love that science is first.  https://school.stmarysfbg.com/history

Very interesting, and wonderful. I assumed that most of the early settlers were all Lutherans, like many of my ancestors.  I'll check that out (and the Magnolia Pearl opium den) next time I'm in Fredericksburg, which, Rufus willing and very good weather, might be over Christmas break.  

 

[Shoobydoo]

On 12/8/2017 at 7:59 PM, bjr70 said:

My mom had words with a Sunday school teacher after I ended up sobbing one day. The teacher told me animals don't have souls, and wouldn't go to heaven. I was devastated that my dog wouldn't go to heaven. The pastor had to calm me down and tell me that of course my dog would be in heaven waiting for me.

That lady never taught Sunday school again while I was there. Funny enough I ended up converting to Judaism as an adult. Trauma, I tell you. This was a United Methodist church, too.

Damn, I've been an atheist since age 10 but that really pisses me off. What kind of shitheel tells a child that their puppy won't be waiting for them in heaven???  If heaven were to exist it would have to be full of pets. My precious kitty being there would be a big plus. 

As an aside, all these posts about mixed Catholic marriages/religious attitudes through the years are really fascinating. FJ has the most interesting threads.

[Cleopatra7]

I think that the main problem that conservative and traditionalist Catholics have with the post-Vatican II Church has more to do with societal changes than with the council itself. Prior to World War II, most white Catholics lived in mono ethnic ghettos where they only encountered people who were exactly like themselves. Because many were also immigrants, it made sense to see priests and bishops as community leaders, since they were often the only people with the outside connections that could make a difference. In such environments it was easy to peer pressure people into outwardly conforming, from only marrying a Catholic from your ethnic group to “encouraging” large families to shaming anyone who watched a movie the bishops disapproved of (I believe a similar black Catholic ghetto also existed that insulated members from whites and black Protestants alike and I plan to write my dissertation on this). That conservative and traditionalist publications bemoan the loss of the white Catholic ghetto is telling in and of itself, since very few people voluntarily choose to live in a ghetto, unless they find a way to profit from it.

However, after World War II, white Catholics began moving to the suburbs where people led more atomized lives that were not centered on the local parish. The war also enabled soldiers from different backgrounds to mix, which made non-Catholics seem relatable. Increased educational and economic opportunities for females made religious life less appealing to Catholic women. Even if Vatican II hadn’t happened, these social changes still would have happened. The real problem with Vatican II is that it raised expectations that the Catholic Church was fundamentally changing when all the bishops really wanted was to put old wine in new wine skins so to speak. The end results made everyone, traditionalists, conservatives, and liberals, unhappy, albeit for different reasons.